Synopsis

THOMAS OF AQUINO (or Aquinas), the
profoundest and keenest defender of the doctrines of the Roman-Catholic Church;
was b. in 1225 or 1227, in the castle of Rocca Sicca, near Aquino, a city not
far from Naples; d. March 6, 1274, in the Cistercian convent of Fossa Nuova,
near Terracina. I. Life. - Thomas, who was of noble birth, was placed in his
fifth year under the monks of Monte Casino. In his tenth year he went to
Naples; and in his sixteenth year, in spite of the opposition of his family,
which was finally overcome by the intervention of Pope Innocent IV., he entered
the Dominican order. In 1245 he was sent to
Cologne to enjoy the instruction of Albertus Magnus, who directed his attention
to Aristotles philosophy and the
writings of Dionysius the Areopagite. In 1248 he was made baccalaureate of
theology in Paris, and the same year began to lecture on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, at Cologne. Returning to
Paris, he taught there a large throng of students. Urban IV. repeatedly offered
him high ecclesiastical preferment, which he in his humility declined. Under
the pontificate of Clement IV. and till 1268, he taught in Rome, Bologna, and
Paris. In 1272, in obedience to his order and the wish of King Charles, he made
Naples the seat of his activity. The last years of his life were principally
occupied with the completion of his great work, Summa theologicæ.
He died on his way to the church council at Lyons.
In 1323 he was canonized by John XXII. If any one is entitled to this dignity
by his life and works, Aquinas was. His piety, though monkish, was unfeigned;
and he prepared himself for his writings, lectures, etc., by prayer. Louis IX.
several times consulted him on matters of state. his industry, as his writings
show, was intense. [Aquinas was declared a doctor of the church by Pius V. in
1567, and has a place with Augustine, Jerome, and Ambrose, among the most
authoritative teachers of the church. Leo XIII., in an encyclical dated Aug. 4,
1879, recommended his works to the Catholic seminaries and theological
faculties throughout the world, as a proper foundation of their religious and
philosophical teaching, and particularly emphasized his political doctrines as
conservative for society. The special title of this great theologian is the
"Angelic Doctor," Doctor Angelicus.]

II. Theology. - In certain respects, Thomas
of Aquino marks the culminating point of scholasticism. He sought to establish
for the science of theology a position of superior dignity and importance over
the science of philosophy, and, on the other hand, the harmony of the two
sciences, by distinguishing in revelation the religious truths which can be
excogitated by the use of reason from those which are only known by revelation.
The doctrinal creed of the church, Thomas treats as absolute truth; but it is a
remarkable fact, that he uses the arguments of the church-teachers only as of
probable authority (Summa theol., i. qu. 1, art. 8). He refers more
frequently to biblical texts than the other scholastics; but this practice does
not purify his theology, but helps to confirm the church-doctrines. his
exegetical principles were good; and he expressly commended the literal
interpretation of the Scriptures, omnes sensus scripturæ fundantur
super unum sensum literalem ex quo solo potest trahi argumentum, etc.
(Summa, 1. qu. 1, art. 10), but could not free himself from
ecclesiastical authority. Thomas did not grant the ontological argument of Anselm for the existence of God. He gives several
forms of the cosmological and teleological arguments, but says, that, while
reason can prove that God exists, it cannot discover what his nature is. His
fundamental conception of God is that of spiritual and active being. God is
intelligence and will (intellectus et voluntas), the first cause.
Thinking and willing are inseparable from his being. He is consequently forever
returning to the idea of the absolute identity and simplicity of God. He
employs all his speculative talent to explain the doctrine of the Trinity; and
yet he declares that it is beyond the sphere of reason to discover the
distinction of persons in the Godhead, and affirms that he who tries to prove
the doctrine of the Trinity by the unaided reason derogates from faith: qui
probare nilitur Trinitatem personarum naturali ratione, fidei derogat (Summa, i. qu. 32, art. 1). Although Thomas did not, like his teacher
Albertus Magnus, regard the world as an emanation from God, he refers its
origin to God's active will, which is nothing more than his active
intelligence, which, in turn, is only the essence of God working as the first
cause. He is again and again forced to regard the world as a necessary product
of the Divine Being, and inclines to the thesis of its eternal existence; so
that he contents himself with saying, "It is credible that the world had a
beginning, but neither demonstrable nor knowable: mundum incepisse credibile
est, sed non demonstrabile et scibile (Summa, i. qu. 46, art. 2).
The doctrines of election and reprobation he considers in connection with the
doctrine of providence. Every thing occurs under the Divine Providence, and
serves a single and final end. Both reprobation and election are matters of
divine decree; and the exact number of the reprobate, as well as of the elect,
is determined in advance. Reprobation, however, consists not in a positive
action on Gods part, but in a letting-alone. God is not the cause of sin.
He simply withholds his grace, and man falls by his own will. In opposition to
the Arabic philosophers, Thomas insists upon the
efficiency of second causes (Summa, i. qu. 105, art. 5), through which
God works. He lays emphasis on the ability of the will to choose between two
tendencies in the interest of the doctrines of guilt and merit.

Passing over to the creatures of God, Thomas
dwells at length upon the subject of the angels, which he discusses with minute
care and speculative skill. He teaches, with Augustine, that the original
righteousness of Adam was a superadded gift. He spent special pains upon the
elaboration of the doctrine of Christs person and work. He affirms the
meeting in Christ of the two absolutely opposite principles of human ignorance
and imperfection, and divine omniscience and perfection. He departs in some
details from the Anselmic doetrine of Christs work, as when he denies the
absolute necessity of the incarnation, and affirms that God might have redeemed
man in some other way than by his Son. A human judge cannot release from
punishment without expiation of guilt; but God, as the Supreme Being, can
forgive without expiation, if he so chooses (Summa, iii. qu. 46, arts.
1, 2). The satisfaction of Christ removes all orignal guilt; and, by the
application of his merit, the sinner secures freedom from and forgiveness of
sin. Mans nature is corrupt, and grace alone enables him to reach eternal
life. Thomas passes directly from the consideration of the work of Christ to
the sacraments. The number of the sacraments had
already been fixed at seven, but his treatment had a shaping influence upon the
discussion of the subject in after-time. He
proved the necessity of seven sacraments, and the immanence in them of a
supernatural element of grace. His treatment of the Eucharist, penance, and ordination, is
characteristic. He held to the change of the elements to the body and blood of
Christ, justified the withholding of the cup from the laity with casuistical
arguments, and spoke of the sacrifice of the mass, now as a "symbolical picture
of the passion" (image representativa passionis), now as a real
sacrifice. It is noticeable, that, in his doctrine of the mass, he does not
emphasize, as do his successors, the idea of sacrifice to the detriment of the
sacramental idea. The subject of indulgences, Thomas handled at length;
teaching that the efficacy of an indulgence does not depend upon the faith of
the recipient, but upon the will and authority of the church, and extends to
the dead as well as to the living (Summa, iii. qu. 71, art. 10). The
discussion of eschatology follows the
discussion of the sacraments. Thomas teaches the doctrines of purgatory and the intercession of saints, he
treats the doctrines of the resurrection and future. blessedness at length, and
teaches that the body of the resurrection will in form be identical with the
present body, even to the hair and the nails.

Thomas was not less great as a teacher of
ethics than as a theologian. Neander has said, that, next to that of Aristotle,
his is the most important name in the history of ethics (Wissensch.
Abhandlungen, ed. Jacobi, p. 46). But both as a moralist and a theologian
he was a true son of the church. His system is, as Baur says, only an echo of
the doctrinal teaching of the church. In the spirit of the day he discussed
many idle and useless questions with casuistical minuteness and far.fetched
argumentation. But he was in this respect more moderate than his
coritemporaries. On the other hand, he discussed many important subjects with a
depth and clearness of insight which make his views permanently interesting and
valuable.

After the death of Aquinas, a conflict went
on over his theology; Duns Scotus being the leader of
the other school. The Dominicans were ranged
on the side of Aquinas, whose followers were called Thomists; and the Franciscans on the side of Duns Scotus, whose
followers were known as Scotists. The difference between the teachers was not
in the doctrines they taught, but in their treatment of these doctrines. With
Scotus, theology was a practical science; with Aquinas, a speculative science.
The controversy lasted down to the eighteenth century; and the Franciscan De
Rada mentions in his work, Controversiæ inter Thomam et Scotum (Cologne, 1620), no less than eighty-six points of difference between the two
schools. The most important points of controversy were the Cognoscibility of
God, the distinction between the divine attributes, original sin, the merits of
Christ, etc. On the subject of the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary,
the two teachers held divergent views; Thomas denying it, Scotus asserting it.
The Jesuits opposed Thomisin, as Bellarmins
example proves; but it prevailed at the Spanish universities of Salainanca,
Coimbra, and Alcala. The Roman-Catholic Church cannot forget the most profound
and penetrating defender of its doctrines until it reiiounces them; and the
Protestant Church will not fail to share in the admiration of Thomas Aquinas so
long as it continues to admire literary greatness.

John P. O'Callaghan, "Aquinas, Cognitive theory, and Analogy: A
Propos of Robert Pasnau's Theories of Cognition in the Later Middle Ages," American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 76.3 (2002):
451-482.